1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and a method for processing mail. More particularly, it relates to a system and a method for processing international priority airmail (IPA) to meet the criteria and to obtain the preferred postage rates set forth by the United States Postal Service.
The United States Postal Service has, for some period of time, provided postage rate discounts for mailing large quantities and/or weight of letters, packages and the like to international locations. Particularly, the United States Postal Service provides preferred postage rates for mailing of nonpresorted and presorted international priority airmail sent to all countries of the world, except Canada. The previous international priority airmail (IPA) postage rate structure provided a flat per-pound rate for nonpresorted and presorted mail.
Recently, the United States Postal Service regulations have been dramatically changed concerning the postage discounts provided for international priority airmail. While the new United States Postal regulations still provide a nonpresort rate option, they now provide for presorted mail a new international zone structure that has three rate groups. The rate in each of the three rate group has both a per piece and a per pound rate component.
Each rate group corresponds to a different one of the three international zones established by the United States Postal Service. In each zone, there is a large number of countries. The countries are not classified by geographical location, but instead are established passed on UPU terminal dues agreements with the United States. For example, group 1 includes many countries in the European market, such as Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden, yet it also includes Australia, but does not include Liechtenstein which is in group 2 and Switzerland which is in group 3.
The rates for the three rate groups for the presorted international priority airmail range from 20 cents per piece and $4.95 per pound to 15 cents per piece and $7.95 per pound. Specifically, group 1 now has a per piece rate of 20 cents and a per pound rate of $4.95, group 2 has a per piece rate of 15 cents and a per pound rate of $6.15 per pound, and group 3 has a per piece rate of 15 cents and a per pound rate of $7.95. The rates in all three rate groups compare favorably to the nonpresort rate of 20 cents per piece and $8.00 per pound. Also, the rate for nonpresort international priority airmail compares favorably to simply mailing individually pieces of international airmail.
To obtain even the nonpresort rate, the total international priority airmail mailing must be ten pounds or more, or 200 or more pieces. These requirements apply to the total mailing, not to each country.
To obtain the more favorable presort rate, the mail must be sorted by country and zone and, in addition, meet the following requirements. The mail in a zone must weigh ten pounds or more and there must be either more than six pieces of mail per country in that zone or a weight of ten pounds or more for mail directed to each country in that zone.
The ability to process a heavy volume of international priority airmail, such as letters, sent by a single entity, such as, for example, a corporation or a bank, in any given day provides significant problems That coupled with the necessity to comply with the United States Postal regulations in order to obtain the most advantageous postage rate, clearly creates even greater problems. Yet, the need to comply with the United States Postal regulations in order to obtain the most advantageous postage rate is readily apparent.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Prior to the present invention, it has been virtually impossible to both process mail and monitor it in order to comply with the above preferred presort postage rate requirements set forth by the United States Postal Service. Heretofore, one was required to have a large labor force to weigh virtually each letter or package and to individually sort each piece of mail and place the mail in the appropriate country bundle. Furthermore, detailed lists were manually compiled on a line by line basis for each piece of mail, and were manually compiled. To prepare such lists are extremely time consuming and expensive.
Also, there has not, heretofore, been a process that provides for simultaneous weighing and recordal of information that leads to the compiling of the desired report. Further, there has not, heretofore, been a system that readily provides for the detailed breakdown needed in order to allocate the postage costs to various cost centers, such as individual clients or divisions within an organization. Still further there has not, heretofore, been a process that provides within the process itself various check procedures to verify that the processed international priority airmail is correctly sorted and meets the requirements of the United States Postal Service.
Thus, the present system provides a comparatively economically efficient system for processing international priority airmail that segregates the mail within zones, and by country in each zone, and provides a detailed breakdown of the number of pieces of mail in each country in each zone and the weight of the mail in each country in each zone.